


Now Show Me a Smile

by AprilDoorKnob



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Comfort/Angst, Fluff and Angst, Galra Keith (Voltron), Gen, Identity Reveal, Self-Hatred, Socially Awkward Keith (Voltron), Team Bonding, astral projecting from 2016 baybee, broganes, from keith and lance, keith and lance get along, light body horror, no actual self-harm but mentions of actions that could be understood as such, no beta we die like men, rated t for blood (a bunch but its not that graphic) and swearing, weird teeth, you belong on the team! and you belong on the team!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:01:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24518860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AprilDoorKnob/pseuds/AprilDoorKnob
Summary: Keith’s had this problem before, but this is the first time it’s happened around his new teammates, even Shiro doesn’t know! …It’s not a big deal, really! But it is weird… And with the knowledge that aliens exist does it hint to something Keith has been trying to not think about? Too bad there are no dentists in space!AKA: Yo anyone out here feeling nostalgic for season 1 era Galra!Keith fic?
Relationships: Keith & Lance (Voltron), Keith & Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 173





	1. The One Where Keith’s Teeth Fall Out and It’s All Lance’s Fault

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't come up with this idea, this is based off the headcannon/AU of shark teeth being a dominant Galra heredity trait, I'm pretty sure it was created by [ an-android-in-a-tutu ](https://an-android-in-a-tutu.tumblr.com/) ? But its been like 3 years and I can’t find the exact post.
> 
> Also, I’m sorry if I get anything terribly wrong, I haven’t properly watched the show since season 7… I’m going off memory, other people’s fanfic and what I could figure from google. (And when I say season 1 era I mean it, a couple small things are pulled from other seasons but most of it disregards cannon after season 1) Also no beta-reader lol, read at your own risk.

"Lance duck!" 

Pidge called out a warning to Lance, the training dummy they were currently fighting was about to hit the back of his head. Lance ducked at the same time he whirled around to look at Pidge, unfortunately bringing his bayard slamming right into Keith’s face.

"Oops!" he squeaked whipping around to face him as Shiro ran up to take down the training dummy. 

Lance held up his hands in a gesture of exaggerated innocence, expecting Keith to snap at him for not paying attention.

Instead Keith stared out into space, standing much too still for the middle of a training simulation, with his hand held over his mouth.

Lance furrowed his brow, "Are you o-" he started asking but got cut off when Keith brought his hand down, holding a couple of his teeth in his palm.

"Holy shi- stop! Time out!" he shouted to Allura, who had been standing in the control booth observing their progress and commanding the dummies, the dummies halted as she disappeared from the paladin’s sight at the outburst. 

"Oh my god Keith I am so sorry! I didn’t think I hit you that hard!" Lance worried, waving his hands in the air not actually sure what to do with them, but they would be at the ready once he figured it out.

Keith ran his tongue over his teeth to inspect the damage, three missing from the top and one from the bottom on the left side of his face, he stared at the matching teeth. 

Hunk ran over but stopped once he realized what happened, Pidge hung back as well, Shiro, ever the leader figure, walked straight up and put his hand on Keith’s shoulder. 

"Let’s get you to the infirmary."

Keith however seemed to have gotten over his shock, and with the most amount of calm he’s ever exhibited said, "Oh, no it’s fine." 

While the others recovered their wits, Keith shrugged and moved to put the teeth in his pocket before realizing he didn’t have any. 

"Fine?!" Lance sputtered "I just knocked your teeth out! That’s not fine!” He grabbed at Keith’s wrist attempting to pull him along, “But maybe Coran can fix it, come on!" He tried for a moment more before realizing Keith wouldn’t budge without more force than reasonable for someone being taken to the infirmary. 

Keith continued uncharacteristically understanding, "It's not your fault Lance, they were going to fall out anyway.” He sighed, “I was just surprised, it hasn’t happened for a good while."

"Uh. What?" Lance asked incredulously. 

"It's just time, they've actually felt weird for a while, I wasn’t paying attention." 

"Um. I repeat: WHAT?" 

Keith frowned at that, "Y'know? When they get loose and fall out and you get new ones?" 

Now it was everyone’s turn to frown at Keith, but Pidge was the one to finally ask, "Are you talking about baby teeth?" 

But Keith rebuked it quickly, "It happened when I wasn’t a baby." 

Pidge rolled her eyes and started to say, "They aren’t called baby teeth ‘cause you lose them whe-" but Hunk interrupted with, 

"Keith you know that only happens once right?" 

Keith took his turn to stare at Hunk like he's the weird one, "No, it doesn’t? it’s happened to me 3 times before." 

Pidge squinted at him, "That's impossible." She said while everyone else turned to see Allura, who had made her way from the observation booth to the training room floor. 

Allura looked to the object of everyone’s attention, Keith, "Oh my, I suppose human teeth are weaker than Altean?” she rhetorically questioned before addressing the group, “Well, what are you all waiting for, get him to the infirmary." 

Keith started, "Bu-"

Before he could get a word out Shiro interrupted his protests, and said "Yes, let’s get going." And herded him along the corridors into the infirmary.

\---

After arriving at the infirmary and paging Coran everyone fussed over Keith, crowding him in and forcing him to take a seat.

"Should we put those in milk?" Hunk asked, pointing to the teeth still in Keith’s fist. 

"We don’t have any milk." Lance reminded him. 

"Allura, is there anything that Alteans do when this happens?" Pidge asked.

"Not that I know of, our teeth are very sturdy, it’s very rare for them to fall out, and if they have there are usually bigger problems to worry about."

"Keith how are you feeling?" Shiro asked. "Fine." Keith answered simply while rolling his eyes. Shiro frowned and started to ask more but everyone startles when Coran walked in.

"What's the problem here?"

All the paladins were about to start talking at once, but stopped once Keith said, very confidently, 

"Nothing." 

Speaking this one word clearly showed off his missing teeth to Coran though. 

"Oh now, that doesn’t look like nothing. Unless humans can grow teeth back.” He looked to the others “Can they?" 

All the humans, except Keith, answered a resounding "No." Keith glared at them in betrayal. 

Coran walked up to inspect the teeth and Keith’s mouth before concluding, "Well, I'm not trained in tooth healing specifically, but, these are nicely intact, we should be able to just stick them back in your mouth, pop you in the healing pod for a couple of ticks and that should do it." 

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief at that, except for Keith who simply sat with his brow furrowed and his arms crossed. 

Keith's face didn’t relax until he was unconscious in the healing pod, his teeth placed back in his mouth as best they go.

They all stood outside his healing pod for a minute watching, expecting an estimation of healing time to pop up on the screen, but the screen didn’t change until the pod unceremoniously spit him out, it hissed open and Keith fell. 

"That was fast," Coran commented while Shiro caught Keith. 

As that happened Lance wondered aloud, "Why are these things upright anyway? What if someone doesn’t catch you?" this distracted Hunk and Pidge enough to not crowed Keith while they discussed possible pros to the positioning. 

Though Keith was only unconscious for a minute he was still groggy from the experience, he shook his head a bit to clear it when Coran asked, "How are you feeling?"

Keith tried to reply with a "Fine," per usual, but as his bottom lip pressed against his teeth to make the “F” his teeth came loose in his mouth.

He spit them into his palm. 

Everyone stared in silence at him holding them out.

Eventually Pidge was the one to notice, "Are there more teeth than before?"

"What!?" Hunk paled. 

"Yeah, there were 4." She confirmed, everyone had the chance to count the 6 teeth in Keith's hand before he clenched them into his fist.

"OK, now I know I didn’t hit him that hard!" Lance crossed his arms defensively, squinting at Keith he asked, "Do you have space scurvy?"

Hunk turned to Lance questioning, "What’s the difference between space and regular scurvy?" 

But Pidge cut off Lance’s answer, "No forget that, we've all been eating the same thing, scurvy is caused by vitamin deficiency, we would all have space scurvy." 

"Food goo nutrients are perfectly balanced." Coran huffed. 

Before this could devolve into an argument on the pros and cons of the goo Allura interjected, "The healing pod did not find anything wrong, according to it he is perfectly fine." 

Everyone turned to look at Keith who was casually poking at one of the teeth still in his mouth and looked like he was about to tug on it, but Lance was next to Keith in a flash and karate chopped his arm down, "Ow!"

"Leave those alone!" Lance scolded. 

Keith pulled his arm to his chest before crossing them in his usual fashion. 

And then looking very casual, as if none of this happened and he did not have a handful of teeth clenched in his fist, he suggested, "Let’s go back to training." 

Shiro frowned and shook his head "How about you get some rest, just lie down and don’t touch your teeth, OK? leave them alone for now. We'll see how you are in the morning." 

"I'll bring you some liquid food to drink." Coran offers. 

Keith eyed them appraisingly, "Fine." he caved but still looked annoyed at all this and walked off to his room without another word.

\---

Keith didn’t say anything when Coran brought him his food besides a hum of acknowledgment. 

When everyone besides Pidge had fallen asleep Lance found himself outside Keith's room, he knocked on the door lightly, but Keith didn’t answer.

Lance figured that must mean he's asleep, and decided to go off to sleep himself, wondering what he was even planning on saying if Keith answered anyway.

\---

The next morning Shiro went to check in on Keith, but to no answer. 

"Keith?” he waited a moment before shouting “KEITH?" as he knocked on the door.

After a couple seconds of silence, he placed his hand on the door pad to find it unlocked, but as the door slid open, also empty. 

Shiro walked down to the training room, where predictably Keith was. He was hacking away at a solo dummy, set on much too high for what his level should be, as usual. 

Shiro laughed and shook his head as he interrupted Keith’s session. "I thought I told you to rest." 

Keith looked up at him after swiftly stabbing the dummy and casually shrugged. 

"How are you feeling?" 

"Fine." Keith mumbled. 

Shiro squinted his eyes at that, it sounded odd. "Can I see?" 

Keith shook his head, then distinctly looked away from him.

"Keith." 

Shiro tried to put aside his growing dread and instead put his stern face on while crossing his arms. 

Keith clenched his fists and stared at him for a moment, but quickly seemed to realize Shiro wasn’t going away.

Reluctantly he opened his mouth to let Shiro see a completely empty mouth. 

Shiro gasped. Keith quickly snapped his mouth shut and brought up a hand to cover it.

"Did...did you pull them out?" Shiro asked horrified. 

"No. They fell out. I told you, they’ll grow back." He ground out, stepping back and lowering his brows in defiance. 

"Teeth don’t grow back Keith." 

For just a second Keith looked worried at that, but quickly shook it off and turned away from Shiro to go back to training. 

Shiro turned away to find a good place to sit down. 

\---

When all the paladins came together for training time Keith refused to speak with anyone. When they tried to ask what was wrong Shiro caught their attention over Keith’s shoulder and just silently shook his head.

This continued until it interfered with training. 

Keith was watching as a shot lined right up with the back of Hunk’s head in a defensive training exercise. Keith moved toward it as fast as he could, but it was too late to stop it, Hunk got shot and was subsequently ejected from the exercise. This sparked a chain reaction in what had been their longest lasting session so far, only lasting a second further with Hunk gone.

Allura stalked up to them from her position as an observer and shouted "Keith! what was that?" 

Keith tilted his head as if to silently ask 'What was what?' 

She scowled, "I saw what happened, you had plenty of time to warn Hunk." 

"What? Hey!" Hunk huffed. 

Allura continued, "It’s not just that though, you haven’t spoken to anyone all day, if something is bothering you it affects us all." 

Keith crossed his arms and looked away. 

Allura’s brow softened but kept her frown, "Is it your teeth? Let me see." 

Keith glanced over to see Shiro cringe. Keith pressed his lips together harder. 

"Come now, a paladin has no use for vanity." 

Keith looked at her. 

"Smile." she prompted while pointing with both hands to her own bared teeth. 

He rolled his eyes at that, but it must have convinced him anyway because he complied. 

"Oh my..." Allura opened and closed her mouth a few times, raising her finger as if about to say something, but put it down and remained silent. 

"What the fuck Keith." Pidge interrupted from beside Allura. 

"Pidge!" Shiro admonished her. 

Everyone came to stare at Keith again, he had shut his mouth quickly after seeing Allura’s expression... But not fast enough, everyone saw. 

"Th..." He started, the sound blurred without the sharp sounds of teeth, "They'll grow back." He said more hesitant than before, but still defiant, glaring at anyone who looked like they might correct him.

"I'm fine. Let’s get back to training." 

"Maybe you should take it easy?" Hunk suggests, "And maybe get you back in the healing pod, like, now?"

Pidges eyes widened "The healing pod didn’t detect any sickness or untreated trauma, no more should have fallen out after the ones Lance caused… he did this to himself." she bluntly deduced. 

Shiro cringed away from the scene, having come to the same conclusion earlier.

"What!? Why?" Lance gasped as Keith glared daggers at Pidge.

"They fell out, its normal!" 

"No, it’s not." she stated simply staring at him. 

Keith suddenly realized there was a glimmer of pity in her eyes. He whipped his head up, looking around scanning anyone’s face for support, some pointedly looked away while others had their faces pinched in worry, no one came to his defense. 

Well so what? They all think he pulled them out and is delusional about how his own body works, fine, they’ll see. And with that thought he turned around and stalked off to his room. 

"Should we do something?" Hunk asked. 

"No, he'll understand eventually." Shiro let him go. 

\---

Dinner afterword was awkward. Space goo, so it was easy for Keith to eat thankfully, but the conversation was dead. 

They ate in silence. 

Lance looked like he might try to say something to lighten the mood a few times but shut his mouth and looked away each time.


	2. Guys I’m Not Crazy I Just Have Super Weird Biology For Absolutely No Reason OK!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's an attack on the planet Prillian and the team needs to respond to it and not let any personal issues (like all of Keith's teeth falling out) distract them. Those personal issues might have fixed themselves in the meantime anyway...or just gotten worse?  
> Also, Keith's cool fingerless gloves are sadly destroyed, Hunk finds his missing hammer (that may or may not have drool all over it), and the team plays keep-away.

Keith couldn’t stop chewing on everything. 

When Keith woke up his jaw was killing him and found himself chewing on his hand. He immediately forced himself to stop, but as he got ready he caught himself chewing on anything he could get his hands on, toothbrush, hairbrush, but mostly his knife handle, so he decided the hand was a safer bet for now, at least until the teeth would start poking through. Plus, now that he put his leather glove on it was a nice texture. 

As he was walking to training Allura paged them all to meet in the navigation room. 

Keith snuck in the back after everyone else was already gathered. 

Once Allura saw that everyone was there she got straight to the point, "I need to know, is this...teeth...thing going to affect forming Voltron?"

Keith pulled a face, "Why would it?" 

"In case you haven’t noticed everyone seems quite upset about it, except for you." 

"Well, they’re my teeth. Stop worrying." He stated bluntly, then looked over the group as if that solved everything.

"Keith, we are rather concerned about you actually, if what Pidge says is true, I’m...we are concerned for your mental health." 

"I'm fine." Keith chewed at his hand a little more violently. 

Coran stepped in "...Well I hope that's true because a distress beacon went out recently, on a planet I’ve visited no less. A small peaceful planet, they may have gotten by just by being unnoticed so far." 

"We're responding to it. Everyone get into your uniforms we will arrive soon." Allura commanded. 

They all went to their stations.

\---

Fortunately, they hadn't needed to find out if they would have trouble forming Voltron during the battle, it turned out it wasn't an official Galra attack, only a group of space pirates. 

They took care of them fast enough that even once they finished attending a quick thank you celebration there was still time to run some lion training drills, much to the delight of the citizens watching from afar.  
The paladins flew in formation, did some target practice with some tall rock structures, and practiced seeing through the lion’s eyes, anything that didn’t involve connecting with each other.

Eventually Keith got tired of the avoidance and bluntly spoke up, "We should form Voltron." 

"Ehhh, I don't know I'm getting kind of tired." Hunk gave as an excuse. 

But Lance stopped flying his lion "No, Keith's right, come on guys." Then flipped his mic to Keith off, "Whatever he's going through we need to support him and I know it’s weird that he wants to go on like nothing’s wrong, but maybe we shouldn't keep pushing him away." 

"But I am really worried about him, what if we can’t form Voltron because I'm so worried! Wont that make him feel worse?" Hunk worried. 

"Not trying isn't solving anything." Shiro stepped in "We-" 

"Hey, did you guys turn off my connection or are you just floating around silently?" Keith asked.

Red had been zipping around the other lions as they floated in place. 

"OK everyone get into formation!" Shiro said after turning back on all channels. 

Keith clenched his jaw over his empty fingerless glove, he had taken it off to give himself something to chew on but now he wished he chose something more disposable, as he could feel the leather ripping with his stress. He knew the others were also stressed about him which was pushing them apart and he was annoyed at their concern which pushed them apart even further, but there was no way such a little thing like that would keep them from doing the most important task in the universe. 

Right?

He worked his jaw harder, then looked up to see everyone’s comm screens on, they all smiled determinedly. Keith let the glove fall from his mouth and nodded with a small smile letting the connection wash over him. 

The citizens cheered as Voltron flew over them.

\---

Their next dinner was much more enjoyable than their last, though Keith was careful to not part his lips when smiling. Everyone almost forgot about what they had been worried about.

But of course eventually someone had to draw attention back to the issue.

"Hey Keith, what’s with your glove?" Lance asked after it caught his eye when Keith switched his spoon holding hand to smack Shiro playfully for teasing Keith about his working habits. 

"Oh?" Keith deflated as he looked down at it, he knew when he put it on that it was a little damaged, but he was in a hurry and didn't see how noticeable the holes were. He frowned; he didn't have another pair to replace these.  
"I must have chewed too hard on it..." He mumbled.

Everyone went quiet at the reminder of Keith's teeth. 

"So how about that dance the Prillians showed us at the celebration?" Allura asked in attempt to distract. But Lance just tilted his head, then tilted it some more looking up at Keith. 

"What are you doing?" Keith asked annoyed. 

But right after he opened his mouth Lance sat up and turned to the table, "Look guys! Keith was right!" and grabbed Keith's chin to force his mouth open, "His teeth are growing back!" 

Keith smacked Lance's hands away but did bare his gums to poke his finger at them and found there were little bits of tooth sticking out. 

Everyone leaned over the table "Fascinating!" Coran exclaimed "Alteans are born with all our teeth, I've never seen them grow in before." 

"Are you sure it’s not bone or something?" Pidge asked, crawling up onto the table to get across for a closer look. 

Hunk pushed Lance out from beside Keith to look as well, "No, those are teeth! They look a little pointy though." 

Keith closed his mouth at that and stood up to get farther from everyone in his face. "I told you so." he crossed his arms and pouted.

Everyone went back to their seats, "Sorry we doubted you Keith." Shiro put a hand on Keith's shoulder and Keith relaxed and sat back down. 

The conversation soon went back to their day of defending the little planet and the party, but Keith's mind wandered to what Hunk had said, he shook it off quickly though, He'd give it another day before actually worrying. 

\---

Keith did manage to give his worries another day, after waking up he didn't even bother looking in the mirror. 

While Lance and Shiro went on a shopping trip and Hunk and Pidge worked on some tech, Keith spent the day alone, mostly in the training room, with his already half-ruined glove dangling from his mouth he dodged blows for hours. At the end of the day he had to throw both gloves out and had moved onto chewing on the handle of a hammer he found lying around, he didn't know what it was made of but chewing didn't seem to damage it so he figured it was fine. 

He almost made it to bed without really worrying yet. But getting ready to sleep Keith finally decided to stop ignoring the problem. 

Keith stared at his reflection for a minute before baring his teeth, they’re more than far enough in that he could tell, once again, they were growing in wrong. 

As Alteans apparently didn't have dentistry he decided to take care of it himself. He went to Coran for the tool. 

"Do you have a file Coran?" Keith stopped Coran as he was about to retire to his room for the night. Keith made sure to mumble to make sure no one could get a good look at his teeth. 

"What do you need it for? Lance has a light file." 

"Something tougher than that." 

"Well, I know Hunk had one of the adjustable metal files last." 

"OK, thanks." Keith mumbled before running off. 

Keith knocked on Hunk’s door determinedly. As the door slid open Hunk gave a bit of a start, the person standing outside not being who he would have expected, "Keith? What’s up?"

Keith rubbed his hands together anxiously when he answered curtly, "Coran told me you had the metal file last." 

Hunk hesitated, "Uh yeah, you...need it now?" 

"Yeah." 

"Well its down in the work room."

Hunk lead the way yawning and rubbing his face sleepily, as he did so something caught his eye, "Is that my hammer?"

Keith looked down, he forgot he was carrying it.

"Is it? I found it on the ground in the training room." Keith handed it over, 

"Ah, so that’s where I left it, I've been looking for it all day."

As Hunk took the hammer from him Keith opened his mouth to say something but then awkwardly decided not to mention, where it had been all day was his mouth.

Once they arrived at the work room Hunk reached down into a mess and pulled out something glowing that resembled what might look like a file. 

"What do you need it for anyway?" Hunk finally asked as he handed it off.

Keith pressed some buttons making the file bigger and smaller, looking for the perfect size, before answering simply, "My teeth." 

Hunk suddenly looked wide awake and snapped the file back out of Keith’s hand. 

Keith sputtered in shock, "What the hell Hunk!?" 

"No no no, what the hell Keith? Nothing involving teeth and a file can be good, explain." 

"My teeth are not growing in properly, so I’m gonna fix them." 

"By?" 

Keith gave an exasperated shrug "Filing them down?" 

Hunk felt a shiver go through his whole body at that mental image, "Aaauuuggg! No, no you are not." 

Keith frowned and tried to grab it from his hands. 

"No." Hunk held it up, high above his head and much out of Keith’s reach. 

As Keith tried to climb Hunk to get at it, Lance and Pidge walked by. "Hey! are you playing keep-away with Keith?" Lance asked. 

Keith had his arms wrapped around Hunk’s upper arm as he tried to get a foothold on his leg, Hunk switched hands to throw it to Lance, "Catch!"

Lance caught and Pidge quickly joined in on the game travelling over to the side to make a triangle. 

Keith ran toward Lance, who threw it to Pidge, who threw it to Hunk, who threw it back to Pidge, who threw it to Lance, all while Keith chased after it. 

Eventually Lanced asked, "Hey what is this anyway?" as he threw it back to Hunk. 

"A file," Pidge answered for him and continued with the query, "Why is Keith after a file?" 

"He wants to do some self-dentistry, and I don’t think that's a good idea." 

"What the hell? Me neither.” Pidge agreed as she caught it and threw it back to Hunk. She turned to Keith, “Come on Keith, they can’t be that bad.” 

"Just give it to me." Keith had now stopped running directly after the file and had started trying to predict where they would throw it, his eyes followed the file flying through the air. 

Lance is the next one to catch it and the next to give his opinion, "No way! Now that we actually know you’re trying to do something horrible; we’re playing keep-away for your own good." he said as he threw it to  
Hunk. 

Keith was getting very tired of everyone trying to tell him they knew what was best for him, "They’re my teeth." Keith practically growled out. 

"My file." Hunk answered. 

"It’s Coran's file!" 

"Did you tell Coran what you were going to do with it?" 

"No." 

"Then no file." 

Keith growled for real as he let out a yell of frustration before shouting, "Just let me have it!" suddenly forgetting to mumble. 

It was only for a moment but he had opened his mouth wide enough to reveal to the trio playing keep-away that the teeth they had all fretted over had not only grown back in just a day, but that Keith was correct there was something wrong, instead of the familiar blunt shapes they were as sharp and pointy as a sharks. 

Keith froze for a moment as he realized his mistake when he caught the trio starring at him, but quickly regained his wits and took the opportunity to tackle the person holding the file, Lance. 

As they crashed to the ground Keith grabbed at the file still held above Lance's head, but Lance’s grip was still tight. 

Keith tugged at it, but Lance refused let go, Keith growled again, apparently a thing he does, right at Lance’s face while baring his new fangs. 

Though Lance's eyes were wide, and a sheen of sweat had appeared on his forehead he held on tight and gave his head a small shake. 

"I need it." Keith suddenly dropped his hostility and pleaded. 

Lance jerked his eyes away from Keith’s teeth to look him in the eyes. He shook his head again but in that moment his grip slackened, and Keith stole the opportunity to rip it out of his hand and take off running. 

Only to immediately be tackled by Pidge. 

Keith still managed to stand up with Pidge hanging onto him and continue running barely hindered. At least before Lance shouted, "Oh no you don’t!" and tackled him as well. 

"Oof!" Pidge huffed as Lance crashed into her while grabbing Keith, but she didn’t let go. 

Keith continued, with minimal effort he dragged two people along with him and managed to get by at a slow walk. Until hunk started walking over that is. 

Hunk stood in front of Keith, crossed his arms and simply raised an eyebrow. 

Keith sighed and went limp. 

"You win." He admitted as he dropped the file. 

As they stood up Pidge asked, "So you know this is weird but not them growing back at all?" 

Keith shrugged, "People only ever made a big deal about the pointy part." 

"Were you seriously gonna file down all your teeth?" Lance asked.

"When they came in before a dentist would fix them...thought I could do it myself..." 

"Why? They’re cool!" Pidge leaned in trying to get a better look before Keith pouted. 

"My foster parents didn’t think so..." 

Lance waved his hand as if to whisk Keith’s worries away, "Well we're in space! No one cares, aliens don’t know the difference, I bet you could even convince Allura and Coran it’s normal for some humans to have sharp teeth." 

Keith didn’t look quite convinced as he raised an eyebrow "What about you guys?" 

"I just said they're cool." Pidge reminded him. 

Lance pointed accusingly at Keith "As long as you don’t chomp those things right in front of my nose again." 

Hunk nods "Why would you care what we think anyway?" 

Keith looked kind of sheepish at that and started, "I don’t know..." 

But after the pause lasted long enough that Lance realized Keith wasn’t going to continue he announced, "OK, now that that’s settled, let’s all head to bed and not do any Saw-style home dentistry." 

Pidge raised an eyebrow as they walk off, "Have you seen Saw?" 

"Maybe. Go to bed." Lance avoided the question as he shooed her off.

Keith walked into his room and paused in front of the mirror, he never had anyone say he didn’t need to change his teeth. 

He gave an experimental smile, and then tried a couple more before cringing, it still looked weird. But he was glad he didn't have to feel that horrible scraping, grinding, sensation again, plus he hadn't thought about it, but he didn't have Novocain this time. 

Even if only half of the crew had said it was cool that was enough to convince Keith it was unnecessary. 

But he was still worried, he knew that Lance was right, Allura and Coran would probably be cool and even if they weren’t he could live with that, he liked them but he hadn't known them that long and their mission was too important to keep them from rejecting him completely. But Shiro, Shiro was like a brother to Keith. 

Keith had met Shiro right after his last dentist appointment, and Keith never saw any reason to tell him about it. 

Now, logically Keith knew Shiro would be fine with him being a freak, or at least get over it like he did when Keith lost the teeth in the first place. But as he brushed his teeth, he found that he kept having to remind himself that Shiro wasn't like any of his foster parents. 

He kept repeating that thought until he fell asleep.


	3. Continuing to be Concerned About One Guy's Teeth When There’s Still An Intergalactic War Going On

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now everyone knows Keith is a weirdo, but when the gang gets a call (for real this time) and have to sneak onto a Galra ship they might start finding out why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More than halfway done!

Keith still woke up worried. 

It was early for breakfast, but he knew he wasn’t getting back to sleep, so he went to the kitchen to serve himself some goo. 

As he sat down at a counter and shoveled the goo into his mouth, he tried to strategize the best way to reveal that his teeth had not only grown back super-fast but were freakily sharp. 

He didn't want to announce it, that'd be weird, but he didn't want to surprise anyone either, like last night. 

His face burned when he thought about how he had snapped at Lance, it was embarrassing! what was he, a wild animal?

Shaking the memory off, he went through a couple of scenarios in his mind; just smile a little bit at a time? Take those who don’t know aside to tell them discreetly? …never open his mouth again? Before deciding he suddenly felt a hand tap his shoulder. 

"Keith?"

Shiro had snuck up on him, or more likely Keith was so distracted he hadn't heard him say hello, same difference.

Keith gave a little wave and swallowed his mouthful of goo. 

"How are your teeth doing? Can I see?" Shiro asked. 

Oh, well this would be way easier than Keith thought then. 

Keith didn't respond verbally, after running his tongue over his teeth to make sure there was no goo left, he just opened his mouth with an awkward lopsided grin. 

Shiro's eyebrows went up and his eyes widened but he didn't flinch. 

Keith rubbed at his bare hands as he slowly closed his mouth. 

"Wow!" Shiro breathed "Uh, that was fast." 

Keith nodded.

"Are they...." Shiro started but put his fingers over his mouth as he tried to formulate what he wanted to say, Keith seemed to be sensitive about this, so he wanted to tread carefully, Shiro felt he already failed him when he refused to believe him. 

But Keith suddenly interrupted him before he could figure it out, 

"They're weird. They’re always weird. I just usually get them filed down." 

Keith looked away and started playing with his food. 

"But Lance, Hunk and Pidge said I didn't have to this time." 

Shiro stepped back at the outburst, but quickly recovered and put a hand on Keith's shoulder, "Of course.” He reassured, “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to." 

Shiro took his own bowl and sat across from Keith, "Here, me and Lance picked these out for you yesterday." He slid a pair of fingerless gloves across the table, Keith slipped them on and looked up at him, Shiro smiled and Keith gave a hesitant grin back. "Thanks."

\---

As the rest of the paladins trickled into the kitchen Keith continued sitting at the counter playing with the traces of goo left in his bowl, Shiro had finished his bowl and had moved to rinse it out but sat right back down to chat. 

Coran and Allura were the last to enter the room. When they entered Keith gave a start and only waved before turning away to think of what to say. 

Lance who was sitting next to Keith seemed oblivious to this because he immediately called them over, "Hey did you guys know Keith has pointy teeth now?"

Keith whipped his head around to glare at Lance before he continued. 

"Humans just have pointy teeth sometimes, cool right?" 

Shiro looked over with a raised eyebrow at that but didn't correct Lance. 

Coran exclaimed as they approached, "Very interesting! Why don't all humans have teeth like this?" 

Allura looked a little more skeptical "But your old teeth were flat were they not? Why would they change shape? Is this related to "baby teeth"? perhaps these are adult teeth?" 

Keith paused before answering, "No, they came in the same last time, I just had them filed down." 

They both gasp at that. 

"Ew! Why would you do that!" Allura asked. 

"People like them better that way." 

Allura and Coran looked at each other, sharing a look of disbelief.

"Well don't do it this time." Allura huffed as Coran nodded before going to get their own breakfast. 

Keith looked over to Lance who gave him a nodding smile and a little thumbs up. Keith stared for a moment before quickly turning to take his bowl to the sink. 

Through the day he was more relaxed but still made sure to cover his mouth if he laughed or yawned.

It was late in the evening when an alarm blared through the Castle of Lions.

\---

The paladins suited up as Allura and Coran inspected the signal. 

When they grouped up Allura informed them, "We need to do this stealthily."

"Why can’t we just turn into Voltron at them?" Pidge asked. 

"They have prisoners. " Allura pulled up images of the situation from afar on the screen. 

"The signal is coming from a planet rich in minerals with low defense, the Galra are probably trying to harvest the minerals for their machines but they’re taking as many prisoners as they can first. They only have one large ship, most likely containing a few cruisers, but it contains both the attacking force and the prisoner’s cells, it is currently taking off now and charging its laser, presumably to fire on the planet to wipe off the remaining inhabitants. We need to stop it fast, but we cannot go in blasting it as we could kill the prisoners." 

Keith looked around the room, everyone had a grim look on their face. 

"How many?" Keith asked, while he didn't want to consider the possibility of failure, if it was only a few versus the entire planet he thought it needed to be clear which option was the better outcome. 

Allura frowned, "2.3 Million." 

Everyone froze at that. Keith put his head down. 

"How did they take that many people?" Shiro asked in disbelief. 

"The Galra thought the distress signal was blocked, hopefully they still do, they’ve been there for over a Phoeb. But one of the citizens managed to finally break through, Neffi." Coran pulled the comm screen up so everyone can see as a stout fuzzy creature waved weakly at them. 

Neffi seemed to be hiding in a dark place, only the screen's light illuminated her dusty scratched face. 

"She’s made it into the Galra base and managed to damage the signal blocker for now, she also managed to get a basic map of the ship off one of the guards." She turns the comm back to Coran, "Paladins, Shiro, Lance, Keith and Hunk will go in the Green Lion using its invisibility to sneak on board to turn off the laser from the inside, Pidge will fly the lion but after dropping off the others she’ll fly hidden close by at the ready.”

Pidge pouted a little but nodded. 

“Me and Coran will be ready with the Castle and navigating your progress.”

Allura turned to look specifically at Shiro, “Once on the ship, Shiro, you will use your arm to open any doors to the laser room as it is a priority to turn that off, then we'll work on overtaking the ship.” She looked over them all. “Is everything clear?" 

"Yes Princess." They all said in unison. 

"Then to the Green Lion."

\---

Getting onto the ship went smoothly enough, Pidge dropped them off undetected, and Shiro's arm opened all the doors as they went through, but with so many people they had some close calls trying to all get behind a corner before being spotted. 

"OK." Shiro eventually relented, "We need to split up."

“Split up the group?" Hunk worried as Shiro continued, 

"Allura can you navigate two groups?" 

"Of course." Her voice rang through their helmets. 

"Keith and Lance, you two go find the navigation room to try and bring the ship back down, we'll meet you there." 

Lance and Keith nod as Allura's voice comes through the comms, "Then Shiro and Hunk you two go right. Lance and Keith go to the left." 

They immediately started off, even with Hunk muttering "Splitting up never leads to anything good in movies..." 

\---

Keith and Lance snuck around in silence until Allura lead them down a path with an unmarked door.

"Oh man! We'll have to go back forever, there’s been no other way to go." Lance deflated.

Keith stared at the offending slab of metal, the control pad identical to the one in the Balmera they had had trouble with not long ago, "It might be unlocked, let’s try it." Keith suggested.

"Yeah like we'd be that lucky to just stumble across the only two unlocked doors in the Galran Empire." Lance shrugged and rolled his eyes but did walk over to put his hand on the pad anyway. 

He waited a moment before lifting his hands in defeat, "Oh well." He turned on his comm, "Sorry, Allura there’s a door we can't get through here." Lance explained as he started walking away.  
Keith stayed behind for a moment to look at the pad, he decided to put his hand on it as well, no harm in double checking. 

He looked smugly at Lance as the door slid open and Lance swung around, "Uhhh...OK Scratch that Allura, we're proceeding through the planned route." He informed before waving his arms at Keith and shouting, 

"What!" 

Keith ignored that and just beckoned him to hurry up, he didn't want to chance it not opening a second time after it closed. 

Lance ran through the doorway just as it started to close, but stopped and stared at Keith once he got on the other side. 

"’What’ what? I got lucky I guess." Keith explained and ran off down the corridor. 

Lance stayed behind pouting and tried touching the pad on the other side of the door, nothing happened. 

\---

They continued running into more doors that Keith opened without problem, and without comment; the first one he kind of chuckled and grinned at Lance like 'wow can you believe the lax security in here', the second one he just looked at it in confusion but kept going anyway, finally at the third one he met Lances concerned stare.

For a while they stood in a silence that Lance eventually broke, looking very nervous, "Hey, uh, this is gonna sound kind of crazy, but you mentioned foster care, and… ok really crazy but...” Lance took a deep breath and put his fingers to his lips before pointing to Keith and asking, “Keith, did you ever know your birth parents?"

Keith shook his head. “I remember my dad but…”

He immediately understood what Lance was implying, the thought had crossed his mind before, though he had considered it too out there to be true. But Lance only had half the clues, he didn't know about his weird knife with the Galra-like symbol and he didn’t see his hand turn purple in that fight with the druid, if Lance was coming to the same conclusion as that he was, maybe, maybe-

Suddenly two Galra rounded the corner. They’d gotten distracted. Lance immediately turned around and shot at the guards, but they took cover too quickly, an alarm sounded. 

"Lance, Keith, what’s going on?" Shiro asked. 

Lance answered as he took up a defensive position, "Sorry we got spotted, how close are you guys to being done?" 

"We're at the controls, there were too many guards but a bunch of them just ran off." 

Allura's voice interjects, "Shiro continue your mission. Lance and Keith, you are now distractions, keep them away from the laser room and lead them away from navigation. Take the next left." 

Keith and lance looked at each other and ran off.

They continued for a while and Lance was starting to lose his breath despite that anytime they got too far away for the Guards to follow they had to slow down.

"Do you think we should split up? Give them more to chase?" Keith eventually asked, planning on being the louder of the distractions. 

"No way!" Lance shook his head and grabbed onto Keith’s arm. 

Keith’s heart stopped for a second as he just remembered why they got distracted in the first place, did Lance not trust him anymore? They only just found out about his heritage there’s no way he would... Keith slowed down a bit, but before Keith's mind could wander too much Lance grinned at him, 

"What if I run into any doors? I need someone to open them for me." 

"Oh,” Keith realized, of course it just makes sense, “Right!" he ran a bit faster at that as they rounded the corner. 

He didn’t even see the guard swinging a club before blacking out.


	4. Trapped With Your Best Friend Who Just Found Out Your Dad Boned An Alien.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith and Lance get confirmation and discuss their discovery but are soon separated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might be getting even more wishy-washy with cannon than I thought. For example, I remember the red lion always having to snatch Keith away from the vast expanse of space he was always throwing himself into, but maybe that didn't happen as much as I thought it did? Because I cant find anything about that except this funny video https://youtu.be/G9OkF3KkSVY and that only has a rescue from their first meeting. but cannon doesn't mean much here in this fic and I want it to be true so by this time Red has saved Keith multiple times from reckless behavior and that video is cannon. >:3c
> 
> oh and this is where the blood comes in tw (starts at the end but continues being mentioned through the first half of the next chapter)

Keith woke up to Lance shaking his shoulder and groaned. But he quickly sat up to check his surroundings, they were in a large cell with a couple other prisoners, aliens of all different races. 

After taking in their imprisonment his gaze went to Lance, who had a bruise forming on his forehead and was looking at Keith worriedly. 

"I guess we got caught." Keith deduced. 

"Yeah, after you got knocked out I tried to drag you away, but I didn't make it far enough." Lance looked down guiltily.

"Well thanks for trying." Keith waved him off and did a quick check to see all their weapons had been confiscated, plus their helmets. He then stood to check out the cell. 

It was bare except for a small toilet, the walls all solid metal but a doorway blocked by metal bars. Keith went to stand by that, and Lance quickly joined. 

The hallway outside was empty, but at the edge of the cell door Keith could see a hand pad like the rest he had opened, he squished his face to the bars to get better look before reaching his hand through the bars to reach the pad. 

Surprisingly nothing was there to stop him from doing so besides it being just a couple inches too far out of reach. As he strained Lance looked up and down the door figuring out the mechanism. 

He startled with a realization, "Hey wait Keith!" 

"What?" Keith grumbled, not quite stopping but not trying any harder to reach. 

Lance pulled him back as he explained, "Even if that’s not locked, if you open it its gonna break your arm. The bars are on a track that will pull into the wall when opened, if it opens as fast as the rest of Galra doors you won't be able to get your arm out fast enough." 

"Oh." Keith stopped trying to get away from Lance, "Hm." 

"Yeah, hm." Lance put his hands on his hips as an alien came up behind him. Keith nodded his head to alert Lance and they both stood to face the unknown creature. 

"Hey." the alien was tall and had four arms, his face was almost covered in fur or hair in a style that looked like a scruffy grandpa. "What are you two doing?" 

"What does it look like?" Keith raised an eyebrow. 

The alien snorted, "It Looks like your trying to use the species-specific door lock." 

Keith crossed his arms, "So?" 

"Well just don't let the guards know you can use those things." 

"We're not gonna let them know, that'd be a strategic suicide.” Lance waved his hand dismissively.

“I don’t just mean for escape plans, mutts aren’t treated kindly in these parts.” 

Lance furrowed his brow and took a small step in front of Keith.

The alien scoffed “It’s not me you gotta worry about, I mean the Galra, they’re big on pure blood. ‘course no one is supposed to be against the empire but if half breeds show any sign of not being 100% willing to jump to any pure blood’s command the punishment is, lets say, not a quick and painless death.” 

“How do you know that?” 

“I’ve seen my fair share of prisoners made an example of. Anyhow, sharp teeth are a dominant trait, don’t go showing those babies off now ya’ hear?” 

Keith hadn’t even noticed he’d been scowling at the old man, baring his teeth, suddenly he wondered how often he was letting his expressions get away from him. 

The old man had walked away while Keith was lost in thought, Lance turned to him with a thoughtful expression of his own.

“So... Your dad really got it on with an alien huh?”

Keith gaped at Lance’s blunt deduction. He tried to think of what to say to that, he couldn’t deny it, he sputtered a couple attempts before just muttering “Oh my god…” and covering his face as he sank down the wall to crouch in a ball.

“I’m just saying, I’m kind of impressed.” Lance grinned.

“Shut up Lance!”

“Haha, sorry, sorry.” Lance leaned against the wall. He didn't seem that sorry.

“This is serious.” Keith said looking up to glare at him. “Galra are evil.”

Lance crouched down to Keith’s level “Well I wouldn’t say you’re evil, just a little grumpy and emo, could stand to be a little nicer to me in particular but you’re not so bad.”

Keith frowned at Lance. “How can I be part of Voltron?”

“Just keep doing what you’ve been doing I guess.” he shrugged exaggeratedly.

“How can you say that so easily? What will Allura do?”

Lance considered this, “Well, I know you’re our best pilot Keith, frankly I don’t think she can afford to get rid of you.” He shrugged, “Hell, you’re the best pilot and you have the strongest connection with your MAGIC LION that CHOSE YOU.” He swung his arms wildly in emphasis, “None of our lions have come to get us anytime we are in trouble.” 

Lance looked down. “Really, if anyone’s off the team…It should be me…”

Keith suddenly was feeling awkward not about his heritage but because even he could see that Lance was feeling insecure about his skills on the team, and he may or may not have brought up Lance’s status as a shitty cargo pilot frequently and maliciously. “Uh.” He stated eloquently.

Lance didn’t notice Keith’s sudden consideration and wondered, “Hey, do you think Red is on her way?” 

Keith hesitated for a second but then let himself take the distraction, as long as he promised himself he would be more conscious of Lances insecurities from now on. “Maybe, I can’t feel her though, she might be too far away.”

“Wouldn’t that be really cool though, if she just busted in here and we didn’t even have to do anything to escape!”

“If she did that we would all be in trouble, there’d be a big hole in the ship containing all our air supply.”

Lance sighed, “Yeah I guess, I’d just be nice to find a way out soon.”

\---

They did not find a way out soon, eventually the ship made it to some sort of port and the Galra officers started sorting and registering the prisoners for transport to either labor, tech or sport. Keith hoped they both got put into the same labor camp, that would make it the easiest for escape or rescue. But realistically he knew either they’d be considered special prisoners and locked deep, deep away, or put into the arena to be made an example of.

A row of guards with guns trained on the prisoners prevented any dissent as Keith and Lance joined one of the many lines waiting to be registered, as close to the back as they could get. 

When it finally came to their turn Keith stood in front, the officer looked at him, still in the paladin armor with Lance right behind him and comically did a double take. 

“Does Zarkon know we’ve captured two of the paladins?” He demanded to the close by guards.

They shrugged guiltily.

He sighed deeply and as he marked down their prisoner classifications he pointed to the closest guard.

“Put them on a high security prisoner ship, we have to get them to Zarkon as soon as possible.”

Keith and Lance shared a look before they allowed themselves to be carted off by two guards, one burly and one lithe, both with helmets covering most of their expressions.

They were led through the winding hallways of the transport ship but the paladins didn’t put up any resistance until after Keith was led into one of the cells and the door slammed shut. 

The two started leading Lance down the hall seperately,

“Hey where are you guys taking me?” Lance demanded.

“Don’t want you two conspiring, now get a move on.” The small one spit.

“Oh come on, I promise not to plan any escape, cross my heart and hope to die, stick-“

A large hand suddenly crashed into Lance’s face. 

While it wasn’t a serious blow it was enough to send Lance stumbling back, and to shut him up.

“Quit blabbering.” The large one muttered while he rolled his eyes, “It’s so fucking annoying when prisoners try and beg.”

Lance flinched as if struck again at being called annoying, Keith was about to move to defend him, 

“Y-“ But before he could get a word out Lance slapped a hand over Keith’s mouth through the cell bars.

“Haha, ok guys I’ll come with you. No worries no worries.” He put his hands in the air in surrender and gave Keith what was obviously meant to be a reassuring smile, and it might have been if his expression didn’t falter just as the doors were closing. 

Keith was left in the cell, alone. 

\---

Keith paced the cell, he looked it over closely for any weak points, he didn’t find any.

He knew he had to wait for an opportunity, patience yields focus. Is what Shiro would say. But Shiro wasn’t there. Keith took a deep breath and tried to restrain himself from beating at the door, that would only tire him out and he needed all his strength to escape.

He sat down next to the door and wondered if Lance was OK. It was Keith’s fault they got caught. Keith rubbed his thumb against his fist. 

He hadn’t gotten along with Lance at first, but he never wanted anything bad to happen to him, and Lance had been …OK recently... Nice even. Keith never really knew what they were fighting about in the first place, he just knew that if Lance wanted a fight, he could have one… Ugh, they would be out of here soon and they could fight or get along all they wanted then, he didn’t need to be thinking about this.

Keith turned around to look out of the cell, the bars were just wide enough to get a hand through, but there was nothing useful in reach. It left him with a view of the empty room they had come through, he kept his eyes on the door and waited for any change in the situation.

\---

He didn’t have to wait that long before a new figure strolled in followed by the two guards, she was much larger and more imposing then the other two, she had a distinguished scar on the side of her face and her arms were bare to show off her impressive biceps. By the way the other two cowered at her sides she must have been someone important.

“This is the best you could do?” She asks the guards looking at the accommodations but doesn’t wait for an answer, “I’ll take this one.” 

The lithe guard looked to her, “Shouldn’t we wait for Commander Seice?” 

She rounded on him and let out a growl, “We can’t let Voltron take the prisoners back.” She composed herself before continuing, “The quicker we split up the whelps the harder it will be for them to track them. Get this one to my ship.” 

“Fine.”

They opened the door and Keith let himself be handled and dragged out of the cell.

Keith repeated over and over to himself patience yields focus, patience yields focus, patience yields focus, as he looked for his chance. But before he could do anything he was cuffed.

The woman led him with the large guard at the front and the lithe one behind, they traveled through the ship, nearing the docking bay where the two ships connected. 

If he got on that ship he would have no idea what would happen to Lance. 

His knives and bayard had been taken away, his arms were restrained...He had one secret weapon left...The imposing Galra was looking away, He was completely outmatched but their backup hadn’t accompanied them and if he could use the element of surprise- he stopped thinking and suddenly bit into the arm of the woman.

His teeth immediately sunk deep into her flesh, he almost gagged at the feeling but forced himself to bite down harder as she screamed in pain.

As he ducked out of her arms and away he took a chunk of flesh with him, he spit it on the ground as he rounded on the smaller guard swallowing his nausea as he kicked the guard in the face hard enough to knock him out.

The large guard finally turned around, Keith had a split second before he rammed into the guard, taking him by surprise. The woman started to recover her wits and let out an angry curse of “Halfbreed.” but while the large guard was winded Keith spun around kneeing the bleeding woman in the head, knocking her out. One left to go.

The large guard was already recovered and was lunging for Keith, he had no element of surprise left and was severely handicapped without the use of his hands but his reflexes, speed and instincts were working perfectly. He jumped out of the way of the lumbering punch and used the guard’s slow recovery time to kick his knee out, he was easily incapacitated after that.

Keith quickly took the key and let himself out as he ran in the direction that Lance was taken, it wouldn’t be long before other guards found the scene and followed his trail.


	5. A little R&R, y’know, Rescue and Reveal… Then Maybe Some Rest and Relaxation.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance and Keith break out of space jail!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woah hi readers! Its time for the last chapter!! it feels like forever since i posted but its only been a week haha

It wasn’t hard to find Lance, the cell really was just on the other side of Keith’s cell, just separated by a soundproof wall.

Keith burst into the cell and quickly let Lance out, Lance stared at his rescuer in shock, raising his eyebrows at Keith.

Keith stared right back at him, until Lance came back to himself as he shook his head and said jokingly, “Wow, remind to never get on your bad side.”

Keith continued staring at him in confusion.

Lance laughed at the absurdity but let Keith know, “You got a little somethin’ right there.” He said miming wiping the side of his mouth.

Keith realized his face was absolutely covered in blood and started wiping it away in vain, he quickly gave up when Lance questioned “You got a plan for getting out of here?”

“We leave.”

“Figures.” He rolled his eyes but followed as Keith opened the door back to the hangar.

They managed to get through a couple hallways before running into trouble, three Galra rounded the corner but before they could get their guns up Keith rushed them, knocking the weapons to the side, Lance

dodged one firing off but by the time he recovered Keith had already taken them all down.

“Y’know a lot of things about you are starting to make more sense.” Lance mused, Keith glared at him in response.

Lance held his hands up, “Just, uh strong, y’know like Allura level.”

Keith nodded, he had been working hard to get his strength up since realizing the fate of the whole universe rested on their shoulders but his progress had been suspiciously fast and he had always been deceptively strong even before he started working out.

“Ugh sorry I’m so useless.” Lance sighed and shrugged.

Keith glared at him again.

Lance threw his hands up in confusion at that, “What I can’t do anything! We’re waiting on your special bond to kick in, you are the one taking down Galra, I got us captured! I’m just along for the ride…Like usual.”

Keith didn’t consider himself good at comforting people, but he knew he wasn’t the type of person to let people shit talk his friends, not even if that person was themself.

Keith turned away from the door, he took a stance with his arms crossed in front of Lance before confronting him, “For one, I’m the one who got us captured. And two, we all have our own strengths.”

Lance scrunched his face up, apparently Keith's 'speech' wasn't convincing. “Some people are more talented than other people, you’re an ace pilot and really strong and I’m not smart like Hunk and Pidge or a Leader like Shiro or Allura…And I’m always annoying people and saying the wrong thing…” Lance refuted.

Keith knew Lance was feeling down on himself but to not consider himself smart? And annoying? OK, there were times that Keith thought that as well... but there was more to Lance then that!

“You are smart. Maybe not in the same way as Pidge and Hunk but you’re good at strategy, and you are selfless, and you aren’t that annoying and...” Keith started to flounder, but Lance was just staring at him, “…and you are good at long range shots!” Keith decided that had to be good enough, if Lance needed more of a pep talk, he could get one from Shiro later.

He pulled a knife off one of the downed Galra, then picked up one of their dropped guns. “Here, watch my back.” Keith said as he tossed it to Lance and walked away.

That act of trust visibly brightened Lance’s mood, he followed, and after a moment with a smirk he let out a “Thanks.”

\---

They continued on, running now, they’d come across a couple of Galra and one of them must have got the word out because all around there were alarms blaring. Keith was still mostly taking care of them but Lance had the chance to shoot a couple.

After sneaking around detours and through a couple vents they arrived at their best escape route, but the hangar was crawling with Galra. Keith and Lance paused in their hiding place.

They seemed trapped but Keith’s eyes shone with knowing as he looked to Lance, “Red’s close, she’ll bust in as soon as I give the OK. But we need to get to her fast, they’ll shut the room off quickly.”

“Wait a minute.” Lance held up a finger and pointed to a door off to the side and made Keith open it.

“They must have dropped our stuff off somewhere, the Bayards at least, Zarkon will want those. And maybe that knife you’ve always got.” Lance explained as he looked around.

Keith helped look, “You think they would put them in such an easy to find place?”

“Those two didn’t seem like the type to do more work than absolutely necessary, first storage closet on the right, why not? If they did their job right in the first place we wouldn’t be out of jail to look for them.”

And he was right, after only a short search Lance let out a “Ah ha!” as he pulled out a box containing all their confiscated items.

Keith put on his helmet and took his belt with the bayard, he had just finished securing his knife when a sound came from the entrance.

“OK time to go!” Keith said as he grabbed Lance’s arm and pushed past the Galra aiming a gun at the two escapees.

Just as they burst out into the hangar a large crash shook the ship. But Keith didn’t slow down even with Lance shouting, “Woah, Whoa, Woah!”

The hull was suddenly breached by a large red lion’s head, and all the air was sucked toward the opening it made. Keith took advantage of the pull and jumped, air and laser fire whipped by them as they quickly flew into the vicinity of the red lion’s maw. She snapped them up and pushed away from the ship.

Keith and lance tumbled in and fell apart from each other, Keith pulled himself off the floor and threw himself into the driver’s seat.

He and Red worked together to escape the hostile situation before more backup could arrive, they dodged and weaved out into space, the Red Lion knew what direction to head towards and Keith let her after a bit of zig-zagging as distraction.

The castle quickly came into view, they flew straight into the lion’s hangar and could feel the change in the air as Allura started a warp.

As the red lion’s defense system started going into sleep mode Keith and Lance let out a sigh of relief, they’d made it.

Suddenly Keith felt the exhaustion of the last day crash down on him, but he still had more to do…But not without getting clean first.

As Red lowered her head to let them out the rest of the team arrived to greet them. They gasped at seeing the state Keith was in.

Keith pushed through his friends as they froze at the mess of blood he was covered in.

He mumbled “…Shower.” as he passed by and left Lance to do any explaining.

\---

As Keith stepped into the shower he tried to avoid looking at the mirror, but one eye caught a glimpse and he flinched. He quickly got under the water and started to wash away the any trace of it but the sight of himself covered in blood was now etched into his mind…He saw pieces of flesh still caught in his teeth, that made him shudder. He quickly grabbed a toothbrush and mouthwash and cleaned his mouth until it hurt.

He was a monster, his new discovery just put another puzzle piece into place. He was always causing trouble and not doing things right, many foster parents had just given up on him. Maybe there was good reason. He just got better at hiding it by the time he found Shiro and his family... Keith was Galra, He was always a monster and now he looked the part.

He had planned to tell the others, if he didn’t they’d probably find out themselves anyway, and that would be worse. The Galra probably know by now. But thinking of telling Shiro…it made him very tired.

He sat down and let the water wash over him for some time.

\---

As Keith got dressed, he realized maybe Lance had already told them, well it would save him the trouble at least.

He couldn’t tell whether he hoped Lance had or not. But the stress of it spurned him into the action of getting out the door at least.

He dragged himself to the lounge where he found everyone, Lance stuffing something in his mouth that looked like cookies, Hunk must have baked them.

For better or worse Lance wasn’t talking, he was listening to Pidge recount of her side of the story,

“They looked all over after securing the ship while I tried to fend off their defense flyers but in the chaos with the laser several escape pods got out as well as a couple cargo ships, we had no idea which one you guys were in and we still had to get control of the engines, after the laser was taken out we got the ship down with no casualties but we couldn’t find you guys. We made sure Neffi and her people all got out OK and-”

She looked up to Keith as he made his presence known, “Yo! Keith!” She pointed to him as she turned back to Lance, “We only found you guys because of his freaky bond with Red.”

Allura sighed, and corrected, “You should all strive to have such a ‘freaky’ bond with your lions.”

“Yeah well, we followed Red right to your location and that’s that.” Pidge waved off Allura’s concern and plowed on, “Now what happened to you guys?”

“Well, we got captured by Galra…And we escaped.” Lance explained hesitantly.

“That’s it?” Pidge questioned Lance’s speechlessness. “No details?”

“Yeah like how Keith got covered in blood?” Hunk prompted.

Lance pressed his lips together.

Keith felt like that was pretty self-explanatory, so he rolled his eyes as he pointed to his teeth. “My hands were tied.”

“Ah.” Hunk nodded indeed feeling dumb for asking.

“If you don’t want to talk about it its OK.” Shiro reassured.

Keith looked to Lance for his opinion, He couldn’t really read Lances expression, but his small smile seemed like it could be read as supportive? He decided to just get it over with.

“Actually… There was something that I learned that I should tell you guys…” He started. “Some of you already know I never knew my mom, she was…mysterious and only left me this knife.”

He held up his knife and unwrapped the hilt, revealing the alien script, Allura gasped and Coran leaned forward for a better look.

“Some things happened that revealed she probably wasn’t human…”

Keith hesitated but there wasn’t really much more to say to stall so he finished awkwardly,

“I’m part Galra.”

Keith took in everyone's reactions, Hunk and Pidge openly gaped, Coran fell out of his seat from leaning forward so far, Allura’s face was contorted in fury, Lance was looking at Allura with furrowed brows.

Keith looked to Shiro, he couldn’t tell what he was feeling, his head was down and he was completely still.

Keith didn’t really know what to do but wanted to say something, “If this changes things…I…I can leave.” he offered. He didn't want to leave, he believed in their cause and thought he could still be useful...but he didn't know if he could bear to stay where he was unwanted.

Three people reacted strongly to that, Shiro’s head snapped up and looked to Keith with a hurt expression, while Allura stood with a stern look on her face and was about to say something...

But before either of them could do anything Lance jumped forward and stood next to Keith.

“Hey, before you guys say anything, I just want to remind you, my boy Keith here is our best pilot!” He held up a finger as if he was giving a lecture.

“He’s saved all our butts. And his parents or blood or whatever has been the same the whole time we’ve known him, same old Mullet. Speaking of mullets, look at his dumb style no way this nerd could ever be evil. Also it’s helpful because he can open the doors like Shiro! And uh when we were in jail we learned half-breeds are treated really badly in the empire so um, don’t be like the empire.” Lance rambled. He hoped he had actually said something helpful and not just made it worse. “Uhhhhh, thank you for coming to my Ted-Talk.”

There was silence.

But after a moment Pidge let out a snort at his dumb joke. “Yeah we get it, it doesn’t change anything.” She waved the notion off and Hunk nodded in agreement.

They weren’t the ones they were worried about though.

Allura still had a frown on her face but was hesitating.

Coran stepped in, “The Galra are victims of Zarkon as well, before the war many were friends of mine. When they stood against Zarkon they were killed. What they have become is not because of their blood but centuries of propaganda and control.”

He placed a hand on Allura’s shoulder in comfort.

Allura looked at him sadly and sighed, “Of course, thank you for reminding me Coran.”

She turned to Keith and admitted, “I am put off and curious about why your mother would be on Earth in the first place, but if you grew up away from the empire you should not be judged on blood connections to them.” She still seemed uncomfortable but sincere.

Keith was surprised by everyone’s acceptance and knew if Allura could put aside her feelings to the Galra then Shiro probably wouldn’t be that bad… But he had been taken prisoner by them, was experimented on, forced into gladiatorial combat and lost an arm. So, Keith didn’t feel it very unreasonable that he was still afraid to look him in the eyes.

He was given no choice though, when Shiro walked up to him and said his name, “Keith…” It sounded hurt. Keith met his eyes, they looked sad, but he was smiling…Why?

Keith didn’t have to long to wonder before Shiro pulled him into a hug.

“You’re like a brother to me, nothing you learn about yourself could change that.” Shiro stepped back to look at him. “Nothing.”

“Oh.” Keith said and gave a little laugh in relief.

He leaned against Shiro and let himself be led to the couch; he thought his exhaustion had caught up to him when they arrived but that was nothing compared to what he felt now.

“Want a cookie?” Hunk offered.

Keith took it and bit into it, “Its good Hunk.”

Hunk smiled and Pidge chuckled, “Good, Lance made him make them as soon as he arrived. He said he needed sugar, or whatever the alien equivalent was, and you definitely would!”

“And I was right!” Lance elbowed Keith, “Right?”

“Heh, yeah you were right Lance.” Keith admitted smirking.

“You look awful, think you should go lie down?” Lance asked after taking a closer look at Keith.

“I’m surprised you’re still on your feet.” Keith threw the concern back.

“Well I didn’t take on multiple groups of three or more Galra in hand-to hand combat by myself and win.”

“He what?” Pidge asked impressed.

“You helped too Lance.” Keith rolled his eyes.

“Alright, I helped after the first couple, You guys shoulda seen us, it was crazy! We just kept running into Galra soldiers and then once the alarm got out! We were way outnumbered, but Keith just kept running right up to them and fought them off like ha! Hya!”

He started miming fighting moves “And I took the ones sneaking up on him out with one of their own guns like 'pow pow pow'!”

Keith smiled and sank deeper into the couch and laughed, “Haha, what was that noise?”

He was too tired to cover his mouth when he laughed, he knew his smile was not a pleasant sight, so he was relieved when everyone carried on like normal.

Lance crossed his arms frowning “You know exactly what that noise was! Now, where was I…”

Keith listened to Lance tell the story as his eyelids drooped and his head dropped against Shiro's shoulder without Keith even noticing.

He drifted off to sleep surrounded by friends. He didn’t even wake when Lance finished his story and Allura announced it was time to go to sleep, he didn’t stir when Hunk laughed at his snoring or when Coran compared him to some weird obscure alien creature, even Pidge poking him in the head only got a grumble. Shiro lifted him up and carried him to bed and tucked his little brother in like he was a kid again.

Though they would have to go and fight for the universe tomorrow, for that night Keith let himself relax and sleep peacefully.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You made it to the end!! I hope you liked it! Thanks for reading! and thanks everyone for the kudos and comments!! <3 that's so nice! ^///^

**Author's Note:**

> Worlds crazy right now, take a break and read some completely unrelated fic like this. Then if you are able, support BLM protests! ACAB!


End file.
